


from crashing worlds to sugar sweet lemonade

by livingtheobsessedlife



Category: Marvel, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Steve Rogers loves Home Depot, Steve and tony retire happily to the suburbs and everything’s okay, Steve’s a badass with a powerwasher, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, WARNING: NOTHING BUT DOMESTIC FLUFF HERE, happy married suburban gays, home maintenance turned into kissing, tony would do anything for Steve
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-25
Updated: 2020-07-25
Packaged: 2021-03-05 18:54:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25500178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/livingtheobsessedlife/pseuds/livingtheobsessedlife
Summary: “Hey,” Tony says, voice soft, leaning against the frame of the open sliding glass door, “What’re you doing?”When Steve looks up at him, he smiles.“Close the door,” Steve says immediately, looking back down at the small machine after the brief sweetness, “You’re letting flies in the house.”
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 3
Kudos: 122





	from crashing worlds to sugar sweet lemonade

It’s not until Tony walks onto the back deck and finds Steve fiddling with a powerwasher (commercial brand too, Tony notes to himself, not-at-all-bitter) that they truly reach a certain milestone of domesticity. It’s also notable to mention that Tony notices he does not mind one bit. Surprising, but… completely fine. Domestic Stark, huh. Who would’ve ever thought?

“Hey,” Tony says, voice soft, leaning against the frame of the open sliding glass door, “What’re you doing?”

When Steve looks up at him, he smiles.

“Close the door,” Steve says immediately, looking back down at the small machine after the brief sweetness, “You’re letting flies in the house.”

Tony rolls his eyes, as he always does, but pushes off the frame and closes the door behind him. He leans down next to Steve and watches him screw the hose into the back of the machine. 

“Where’d you get this thing?”

“Home Depot. Great place. You ever been there? They have anything you could ever want. And everybody that works there was so nice and helpful! Ron over there set me up with this rental.”

Steve moves around to turn the hose on, hands fidgeting idly with the various cords of his new toy. It looks vaguely like madness to Tony, but Steve looks like a kid who got the coolest new toy. 

“I could’ve made you one, y’know,” Tony mumbles, still only half aware of what the thing is at all, “l could’ve made something way better than that and you never would’ve even had to leave the house.”

Steve shrugs, “I know, Tony. I’m sure your version would be amazing, but I just wanted to try this one, okay?”

Tony doesn’t respond, just watches Steve as he tugs on the extension cord one last time and switches the knob from OFF to ON. It whirs to life, and Steve smiles devilishly. 

“Seriously, Steve, what’re you gonna do with that thing?”

Steve whips the hose once so that the winding cord ripples along the backyard, and he grips the nozzle of the pressure washer like a fully automated SHIELD weapon and not a mere backyard tool. He looks completely serious, and he grins. 

“I’m cleaning the house, Tony. Now watch out. The directions said the water pressure on this thing is seriously dangerous.”

And with that, Tony took a step back and watched as his partner spent the next six hours climbing up and down a ladder and washing the back siding of their new house. Tony can’t help but think it’s all very… suburban of them. Halfway through, he brings out an ice cold glass of iced tea for Steve, and 15 minutes later Steve, soaked with sweat, peels his shirt off. Tony doesn’t mind at all. 

The thing is, it happens again a few days later. 

Tony wakes up early- not _early_ early, but early for him. Steve’s surely been awake for hours now, as per usual, nothing strange. He goes on a hunt for his husband, and even more importantly, a cup of coffee. 

He finds the coffee, sitting hot and idle in the same place that Steve leaves it for him every morning. But Steve isn’t at any of his regular spots. He isn’t reading a paper at the counter or sketching on the couch. He isn’t even sitting in the backyard reading in the shade. 

Eventually Tony does find Steve. He follows the loud beeping to the front driveway and finds Steve directing a dumpster backing it’s way up the driveway. Steve guides the truck closer and closer to the house, waving his arms like an airway controller. Tony can hear the tinge of his Brooklyn accent emphasized when he calls out over the noise of the huffing truck to the driver, “ _ALRIGHT. LITTLE MORE. C’MON. BACK IT UP. CLOSE, CLOSE, CLOSE- EH. YOU’RE GOOD!_ ”

Tony leans against the house and watches as Steve hauls one huge arm up and pulls at a heavy latch on the back of the truck. The back falls down with a crash, and a large tarpfull of mulch spills out of it. Steve immediately gets to work transferring the dirt onto their long driveway. 

Steve doesn’t notice that Tony’s standing there watching until he’s waving the driver goodbye and watching the dumpster turn off their street. He breaks out into a smile on sight. 

“Morning, sleepyhead.”

“Morning,” Tony says right back, tipping his mug amiably in his husbands direction, “What’re you up to?”

Steve has a firm grip on a long shovel, which he shoves hard under the mound of mulch, pulls out a large pile, and dumps smoothly around the nearest flower bed. 

“Doing some landscaping,” He says, succinct and simple. He’s already sweating pleasantly through his shirt.

“You know we usually pay people to do that, right?”

Steve nods, takes another stab at the small dirt mountain now taking up their driveway, “I know, but I wanted to do it this year.”

“Isn’t it gonna be hard?”

“Well, yeah, maybe a little, but I don’t mind. C’mon, babe, stop worrying. You don’t even have to do anything. Grab a chair and sit out here with me. It’ll be fun.”

Tony can’t argue with that. 

He goes out back, grabs a white plastic lounge chair and sets himself up in the front yard with Steve. They spend the entire day like that in the sweating sunshine. Tony lounges, watches his husband, even briefly falls asleep in the sunshine, while Steve works hard and sneaks looks at his sleepy husband lounging under the sun. 

It’s all very domestic of them, and when Steve has the driveway cleared and all the landscaping primly mulched, Steve wakes Tony up from his nap with a sweaty kiss on the lips.

“Wakey, wakey,” He murmurs, leaning the top of one thigh against the edge of the lounge chair as he kneels in the grass beside his husband, “Wanna go in? Take a shower?”

Tony blinks awake and hardly takes a moment to think, reaching out to mindlessly touch at Steve’s jawline, “ _Oh, hell yeah_.”

Steve hauls Tony up in his arms and carries his cursing husband into the house bridal style. It’s ridiculous. 

It’s not until three days later, the yard perfectly manicured and the back deck power washed down to its freshest color, that Steve’s domesticity streak comes to a head. 

Tony catches Steve surreptitiously painting the side of the house.

“What’re you doing?” Tony demands, letting the screen door slam shut. He stops at the small slice of yard at the side of the house, hip popped and arms crossed as Steve is bent over pouring beige paint into a pan, “I thought we were gonna pay somebody to do this.”

Steve slowly rises and turns, a wild animal caught by human light rising to the occasion like an organic corkscrew.

“Painting the house,” He replies slowly, but he knows that wasn’t what Tony meant. 

Tony taps his foot impatiently, “What’s with your sudden obsession with home maintenance?”

Steve looks around like he knows he did something wrong, paint roller dripping idly in his hand. Tony would almost laugh if he wasn’t starting to get genuinely worried.

_Why hadn’t Steve ever mentioned wanting to go to hardware stores and order dumpsters full of mulch before? Why does he want to build sheds and paint walls and makeover their kitchen? And why does he do it without telling Tony? Does he think Tony’s too spoiled to want to know his husband’s interests?_

Tony’s mind goes to the worst first. Steve takes one look at Tony’s face and immediately drops his paint roller into the tin. 

“Oh, Tony, it doesn’t have anything to do with you. It’s just- I’ve never had my own yard before,” He says the last part so quickly, Tony has to latch onto the words like a man jumping off a train to really get them. 

Oh. 

“I mean, I lived in Brooklyn for most of my life. And then I didn’t really have anywhere but a cot when I was in the war. And then I came out of the ice, and there was so much stuff, but almost none of it was really mine. And since we’ve moved out here it’s like, I don’t know, I’ve never had anything like this. I wanted to try the handyman, homeowner thing for a bit.”

_Oh._

Tony takes three long strides toward Steve and wraps his arms immediately around his husband's neck. Like an instinct, Steve’s hands anchor themselves at Tony’s waist.

“Babe,” Tony breathes out, “This is all yours. It’s all for you. Everything you want- it’s yours.”

Steve’s breath hitches. 

“Thank you.”

They stand there like sweet, lovesick idiots, cradling each other in their arms next to a house with a couple vague crisscrosses of wet paint, and rock back and forth softly under the rays of the mid-afternoon sun. Tony’s bare feet itch in the green grass. 

It’s not until they’ve been standing there for several minutes that Tony realizes Steve’s hands are vaguely sticky. 

“Uh, Stevie?”

Steve pulls his head off Tony’s shoulder, “Yeah?”

“Was there something on your hands?”

Steve looks down slowly.

“Oops.”

Tony follows his eyes, and sure enough there are two distinct beige-colored hand prints stenciled in on Tony’s hips.

“Oops is right,” Tony laments, but his voice is soft, “Do you have any idea how much these pants cost? These are designer jeans. One of a kind gift from Calvin Klein himself.”

“Well you shouldn’t have worn designer jeans while we’re painting, Tony,” Steve retorts lightheartedly, as if it was obvious. He punctuates it with a succinct peck on the lips. 

Tony pulls his pointer finger through a clump of paint at his hipbone, and wipes it on Steve’s cheek, “Jerk.”

Steve just laughs and kisses Tony again, uncaring.

“Hey, in all seriousness,” Tony says, grabbing at Steve’s biceps, “If this is something you’re interested in doing, I can talk to Pepper about having one of her landscaper friends call us, and he can give you some recommendations. We can plant some more stuff out front if you want and-“

Steve kisses the words out of Tony’s mouth, laughing through it. 

“How about we start with buying a grill for the back porch, and I cook you dinner once or twice a week, yeah? Maybe we buy a nice, new lawn mower?”

“Ooh, do you want me to design you a new mower? I can totally beat whatever brand they’re trying to sell you at-“

“How about we stick with commercial brands for now, babe?”

Tony feigns a pout, as he’s done his whole life. It’s the kind of thing that Steve sees right through. He kisses that right off, too.

It’s ridiculous of them, standing at the side of their house. Their neighbor’s nearest facing wall is less than twenty feet away, there’s a window to their new neighbors’ house not three feet above their heads, and there’s a direct line of sight of the pair of them from the cul de sac. Tony plants another kiss on Steve’s lips anyway. Maybe the whole domesticity thing isn’t the worst thing in the world.

**Author's Note:**

> find me on tumblr @dammit-stark if you wanna ramble about stevetony or literally anything idk


End file.
